High-dose
vitamin D supplements costing less than one pound ($1.58)
a year could reduce fractures in the elderly by more than 20%,
UK researchers said on Thursday.

The brittle-bone disease osteoporosis
is common among the elderly, but scientists at the University
of Cambridge in England have shown that large doses of vitamin
D, taken only every four months, can cut the risk of broken bones
among 65 to 85 year olds.

"Total fracture incidence was reduced
by 22 percent and fractures in major osteroporotic sites by 33
percent," Kay Tee Khaw, a professor of clinical gerontology, reports
in the March 1st issue of the British Medical Journal.

Fractures of the hip, wrist and
spine are most closely linked to osteoporosis.

Khaw and her team said the result
has important implications for public health policy-makers because
they show vitamin D supplements can prevent fractures on their
own.

Previous research had found that
vitamin D was effective when patients took it with calcium. Studies
have also tended to focus on women, who are four times more likely
than men to suffer from osteoporosis.

"Many interventions effective in
high-risk groups are not feasible in the general population owing
to poor compliance or side effects or are not cost effective,"
Khaw and her colleagues write in the report.

"In contrast, the cost of four-monthly
oral 100,000 IU vitamin D is minimal (less than one pound annually),"
they add.

Khaw's team found the vitamin supplement,
taken every four months for five years, helped women more than
men. Women taking the supplement were 32% less likely to have
a fracture, while only 17% fewer men broke bones if they took
the supplement.

Khaw and her colleagues followed
2,686 people--2,037 men and 649 women--for five years. Half were
given vitamin D tablets, while the other half received placebos.

Although osteoporosis affects both
men and women, it is much more common in women, mainly because
of the decreased production of the hormone oestrogen after menopause.
In the first five years after the menopause women can lose up
to 15% of their total bone mass.